Maybe this is how it’s done? “More than 1,300 parents in the Ankeny Community School District signed a petition threatening to unenroll their children if the district reinstates its mask mandate.”
KCCI News reports that more than 1,000 students unenrolling (at a loss of about $7,000.00 per student) “could be devastating to the district and its students.”
That, after a long school board meeting at which a mask mandate was put in place.
Parents went to the board meeting. They told them they did not want a mask mandate. The board voted for a mandate. And now, as many as 1,000 students could be leaving the district to pursue education by other means.
The district, responding to an online petition, stated that it is aware that parents have the right to unenroll their children, but I can’t find any evidence (yet) that the board is reconsidering the measure.
Maybe they think it’s a big game of chicken?
Making masks optional would end the standoff, and looking at Iowa’s covid data, I’m not sure why they have a mandate of any sort.
No one under the age of 29 has died from or with COVID in Iowa. In the same 18-month period, 24 Iowans under the age of 20 were reported as COVID positive in a hospital.
It looks like a no-brainer to me, but the district chose a mandate that could cripple it financially. And that, in my mind, is good news. Until public schools compete for students, boards and administrators will act like kings instead of servants.
